


Black and Blue

by lethal_formula



Category: Love Live! Sunshine!!
Genre: Detective Kanan is on the case!, Gen, Light Angst, Minor Injuries
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-06-04
Updated: 2020-02-21
Packaged: 2020-04-07 20:07:43
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,994
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19092217
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lethal_formula/pseuds/lethal_formula
Summary: Mari is turning up to practice with some enormous bruises lately, and won't talk about where they're coming from. Kanan is curious about the source of Mari's injuries, and the fact that her friend is being evasive is only worrying her more. Dia is worried that the two are on a collision course for another falling out - but she can't deny her own concerns. Is Aqours on course to break up once again?It's time for an angsty third year story! There's a little bit of injury talk here, but it's only minor things - bruises, grazes and small cuts.





	1. Chapter 1

“Good work girls, that’s it for today! Let’s go get changed.”

Kanan brought another practice session to a close, and did so with a smile on her face. Aqours had been invited to perform in Numazu, and a couple of weeks out the whole group was looking like it would nail the show. Although they wouldn’t be performing any new songs – those were always best saved for Love Live events – it was always good to sharpen up on the crowd favourites.

As she began to change, Kanan thought back on everything that had happened recently. She’d been brought back into the school idol club, as much as she had tried to avoid it, and was performing alongside Dia and Mari again. In fact, if it hadn’t been for Mari, she’d probably never have been on stage again. Kanan glanced over at her troublesome friend, and at that moment her train of thought completely derailed.

“Hey Mari, are you alright?”

“Of course,” replied Mari in English, cheery as ever. “Why?”

“Your arm, you look pretty banged up.” There was a bruise on Mari’s upper arm, just below the shoulder. It was a bit faded, but had clearly been massive and quite deep. “Did you bump into someone during practice?”

“Oh… yeah, that must have been it. It’s okay, I’ll be fine.”

“Are you sure?” asked Kanan, trying her best not to sound sceptical.

“Yup! You worry too much. Drop by my place and put your feet up for a while.”

“I might take you up on that.”

“You should, it’s impossible _not_ to relax there. Ciao!”

Mari finished up and said her goodbyes. Nobody else saw the frown on Kanan’s face.

 

* * *

 

“So what it means is, if there are two equations here and both of them feature x as a variable, that means that x is the same value in both – it can’t mean 3 in one and 5 in the other,” explained Dia. “Do you see?”

“I… I think so,” replied Ruby, lacking conviction in her words. She wasn’t finding algebra easy.  
  
“That’s good. I’ll head back to my room, then. Call me if you need anything else, but promise me you’ll see how much you can do on your own first.”  
  
“Okay, I’ll try,” replied the younger Kurosawa, clearly eager to impress her older sister. “ _Ganbaruby!_ ”  
  
Dia was satisfied with another successful homework help session. She had been reluctant to help Ruby for a while, after she intervened too directly in Ruby’s summer book report and ended up getting her into trouble – a rare mistake. But she couldn’t help but worry after her younger sister, and reasoned that if she limited herself to indirect help, they would both stay on the right side of the teachers. Dia sometimes got the feeling that she perhaps doted a little too much on Ruby – Chika’s sisters certainly seemed to have a much more distant relationship with her. But that was how things had always been, and she had no intention of changing it.

The only downside was that it did mean Dia’s own work took a little longer to finish. She was just about to return to it when her attention was pulled away by the buzzing of her phone. Dia wasn’t expecting any calls, but could hardly refuse this one.

“Kanan? How are you?”

“I’m fine,” she responded. “But I wanted to talk to you about Mari. Has she had any accidents in practice lately?”

“No, I don’t recall her doing so. May I ask why you wanted to know?”

“She had some major bruises on her arm at practice today, and I’m a bit worried about her.”

“Have you asked Mari about this?”

“I did, but she seemed kind of evasive and just told me not to worry. But you know what Mari’s like with injuries.”

“That’s true, but I also know what you’re like,” came Dia’s calm retort. “If Mari believes herself to be fine, I’d be inclined to accept that. This has only happened once, no?”

“Well, yeah…”

“You worry too much about her.”

Much to Dia’s surprise, Kanan chuckled. “I’ve heard that, yeah. Thanks Dia, I’ll sleep on it.”

“Very well, goodnight Kanan.”

Dia hung up and turned her attention back to her homework. Between Aqours, her student council duties and Ruby’s requests, she had a lot on her plate, and homework was normally the last thing she tackled. But it was already 8:30pm and she’d barely started, which was becoming an unfortunate trend. This paper was going to take at least two hours to do properly Less diligent students might have turned in a quick and dirty job, but that wasn’t in Dia’s nature – she’d be lucky if she had any free time before she slept. Still, Dia had her ways to beat the stress, so she poked her head back out of the bedroom door.

“Ruby, is your work going well?”

“I’m on the last question now. How are you doing, sis?”

“Not as well as I’d like, I had to take a call from Kanan. Once you’re finished, could you please bring me some green tea?”

“Okay!”

Dia sat down again and looked at her paper, then let out an involuntary sigh. Kanan and Mari rarely fell out, but when they did it tended to be particularly bad, and something about this whole situation seemed like it had the potential to be troublesome. The last thing Dia needed was to concern herself with keeping her classmates in check. She tried as best she could to put it out of her mind, and began to write.

Ruby knocked on the door and entered the room. “I brought your tea!”

“Thank you, Ruby.”

“Hey sis, why did Kanan call?”

“Oh, uh, she just had a question about tomorrow’s classes.”

“Ah, okay. I’ll let you work, anyway. I’m going to my room for the night.”

“Goodnight, Ruby.”

“Night sis!”

Dia’s lie came in the heat of the moment, but she knew it was for the best – if something _was_ going to blow up between Kanan and Mari, she’d rather not have Ruby involved.

 

* * *

 

Up on the roof of Uranohoshi, everyone had gathered together for another training session, and were performing their warm-up exercises. Dia had partnered up with Mari, which Kanan suspected was done to keep them apart. Being honest with herself, she would definitely had tried to get a closer look at Mari if she’d been able to, so if that was Dia’s intention then it was working. She’d just have to watch Mari like a hawk.

Unfortunately, concentration wasn’t something that came easily around Aqours, and the distraction of the day turned out to be Yoshiko and Hanamaru winding each other up. Every time Hanamaru failed to address Yoshiko as Yohane, Yoshiko would swipe her noppo bread and have a bite to spite her. Sometimes, it was hard to believe they were in high school. Kanan idly wondered if they had been so immature as first years. _Oh, who am I kidding?_ , she thought. _Mari and I were acting like feuding children just a few months ago. Oh crap, Mari!_

Kanan turned back to observe her friend, who she suddenly noticed was wearing suspiciously long sleeves for this weather. _I’ll bet she’s hiding some–_ “Ow!”

Not thinking about where she was going, Kanan had spun around straight into the path of Chika, and both girls were knocked to the floor. “Sorry Chika, I got pretty careless there.”

“Don’t worry!” Kanan was relieved. It wasn’t easy to shake Chika when she was in a good mood. But then the orange-haired girl suddenly looked concerned. “Hey, is your knee okay?”

Kanan, still floored from the collision, looked down to see a small trickle of blood emerging from a graze on her knee. “Oh, I should be fi–”

“ _Oh Kanan! It’s disaster!_ ”

Mari leapt into action with her usual dramatics – and thankfully some band-aids. “Whatever am I going to do with you? You have to be more careful! Do I need to order a helicopter to the hospital?” Kanan couldn’t decide if this over the top concern was Mari’s way of showing that she was genuinely concerned for her wellbeing or her way of making fun of Kanan’s level of concern over her own injuries. Knowing Mari, it was probably a bit of both.

“Here, let me help you up.” Mari rolled up her sleeve and grabbed Kanan’s arm – and that’s when Kanan saw another bruise. This one was pretty fresh, too.

“You worry too much about me, Mari,” said Kanan. _And not nearly enough about yourself_ , she concluded in her own mind. It was time to find out the source of Mari’s injuries, whether Dia was willing to help her or not.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Oh my, this can't be good. What's going to happen next?
> 
> Here's the first part of the angsty third year fic I teased before, partially based on real world events I can't reveal just yet. (It'll all make sense later, trust me.) I decided to do things differently this time and upload chapters as they're written, rather than doing the whole story in a single go as I did with Digital Disguise. Hopefully this introductory chapter is enough to tempt you back for more.
> 
> In my first draft of this chapter, Dia was way too stiff and formal. I've toned that down a lot so hopefully she comes across as slightly less Victorian!


	2. Chapter 2

Mari had always loved the evenings in Uchiura. You could experience some spectacular views as the sky turned orange and the sun dipped behind the hills, with the whole scene reflected brilliantly by the shining sea. When she got the chance, she enjoyed nothing more than sitting on the beach and watching the sunset.

As she flipped the light switch, Mari let out a little sigh. How long had it been since she’d actually been _able_ to go down to the beach and watch a sunset? There was never time, not any more. Mari sat back down at her desk and slumped forward, face down on the desk. Ever since she’d come back to Uranohoshi, Mari’s schedule had been packed. Classes during the day, practice in the afternoon, office work in the evening and homework at night. It was a good job she loved the school so much, because she spent more time there than she did at home, and she’d lost count of the amount of beautiful sunsets she’d had to experience from within the walls of the director’s office.

Of course, Mari couldn’t go home. There was too much at stake. She knew exactly what the consequences would be if Uranohoshi was merged with the school in Numazu. A sudden influx of new students would mean they’d need some additional teaching staff, but not nearly as many as Uranohoshi employed, and that’s to say nothing of the other staff – the administrators, the groundskeeper, all sorts of people. More than one of her teachers had already given her a fright by asking her to stay after class to discuss her homework, only to explain that her work was fine, but they were privately worried that they might not have a job next year. All Mari could do was repeat the official line, telling them that the board was hoping to keep the school open and that all staff would be looked after, but she could barely convince herself of that. Honestly, what kind of 17 year old has to discuss their own teachers’ employment status? It was such a messed up situation.

All that would be fine if she felt like she was making any headway, but Mari didn’t feel like she was any closer to actually keeping the school open. Prospective student numbers were still pitifully short of the registration target of 100 that her dad had set, and she was running out of ideas. She was running out of time too, and it was getting harder and harder to maintain her cheery disposition in front of the rest of Aqours – especially Kanan. If Kanan knew just how stressed Mari was, she’d overreact again. That meant that telling Dia was out too, because she’d eventually let something slip. But who else could she talk to? She could hear their reactions now. “Oh, but the Ohara family is so rich, surely you can’t have anything to worry about? Couldn't you just hire someone?”

Mari picked herself up and looked at the laptop again. The only thing left to do tonight was marketing. She had a bit of an eye for this and was particularly keen on social media – she looked at everything from fashion brands to soft drinks, and of course schools. That at least made tonight a bit more enjoyable, as it was time to schedule Twitter posts for the next week – and this week she was trying some short videos. She’d got Yoshiko to edit them and they turned out pretty well, so she was hoping that they’d help show the fun side of the school. She decided to take a quick moment to scroll down her feed. A link to an interview with Nico Yazawa, promotion for the next Blood Stain Child show, a post from Hanamaru about some stream. _Wait_ , thought Mari. _Hanamaru is posting?_ She’d have to keep an eye on that. A video from UTX… Mari slumped back in her chair. This would all be so easy if they weren’t in such a small town…

_No!_

Mari snapped herself out of her idle daydream. _No,_ she reaffirmed. _Kanan will get mad._

The UTX video had started over. _Gotta get this done,_ Mari thought to herself. _If I don’t get it done tonight, I’ll just end up needing to come in early tomorrow._ She clicked over to the scheduling tab, then stared blankly at it for a moment. She tried to think of some words to convince people to watch the video, but nothing actually ended up on the screen. Mari came to a decision. She wasn’t getting anything done, and it wouldn’t help to stay here any longer. It would be better to get back to the hotel, get some food and a good night’s sleep, then look at it all with fresh eyes in the morning. She stood up to leave, and-

“Good timing!”

“ _Jesus_!” exclaimed Mari, slamming her laptop shut. “I didn’t think you’d still be here!”

Dia stepped in from the doorway, her usual stern demeanour replaced with a sheepishness after shocking her friend. “There was a graduation committee meeting,” she explained, scratching her beauty mark. “It ran late, so I thought I’d come to see if you were still around – we can walk down the hill together.”

“Graduation, _how exciting_!” said Mari. Behind the affected smile, doubts flooded her mind. _By_ _graduation_ _, this will all be over. By then,_ _it might be too late._

“It is!” replied Dia, with utmost sincerity. “Every year, I’ve watched the student council president give a speech at graduation, and every year I hoped I’d get to do it one day. This year, my turn has finally arrived.”

 _She never changes_ , Mari thought to herself. Dia had always been dependable, and was quick to take on responsibility whenever she got the chance. She’d always naturally assume a leadership role in classroom group activities, and her natural air of authority meant that nobody ever really questioned it when she started issuing orders to everyone else. Mari wasn’t like that, really – growing up in a wealthy family, she’d been quite pampered and developed a bit of a talent for goofing off. She half suspected that being offered the director’s job was her dad’s way of trying to get her past that, and if it wasn’t Uranohoshi’s future at stake, she’d never have risen to the challenge.

“But, doesn’t it… bother you?”

Dia didn’t hide her confusion at the question.

“You know, graduation,” Mari continued. “Standing in that hall for the last time…”

“But it won’t be,” Dia responded. “I want to see the second-years off. And then the year after that, I get to watch Ruby follow in my footsteps, taking her first steps into adulthood. Do you think I have any intention of missing that?”

“No, of course not…”

 _Oh my god_ , Mari thought. _Just what I need_. She couldn’t tell if Dia had total faith in her or had gone into a state of complete denial, but her apparent conviction that she’d be watching Ruby graduate right here was just extra pressure to get the job done.

“You look tired,” said Dia. “Let’s go home. I still need to finish my English homework.”

“Oh, I’ve actually got that done,” Mari remarked with genuine surprise.

“Wow, you’ve changed since first year. Be honest with me, did you ever do any of your homework before deadline night?”

“Actually, most of the time I did it the morning before the lesson,” Mari responded, missing the most perfect look of horror on Dia’s face as she turned to lock her office.

 

* * *

 

On her way to the kitchen to get a glass of water, Ruby couldn’t help overhearing Dia as she passed her sister’s room.

“I don’t know, but something was definitely up… She reflexively went to close her laptop… No, I don’t think so. I told her I was working and she didn’t seem to question it.”

 _That’s a strange conversation_ , thought Ruby. _I wonder who sis is talking to?_

 

* * *

 

Mari opened her laptop, intending to take one last look at the registrations before bed. It wasn’t a useful practice – the last time it had actually changed during the evening was at least a month ago – but by this point it had become a ritual.

As she waited for the computer to wake up, she couldn’t help bet reflect on her encounter with Dia in the office. It was clear that she was being weird – Dia was a horrible liar with an obvious tell, and even if Mari hadn’t spotted that, she should have known that the director would have been invited to any meeting of the graduation committee. What she couldn’t work out was _why_ she was being weird.

As the password screen faded away, _that_ browser tab came back into view.

 _Screw it_ , Mari thought. _If_ _I’m going to take on the stress of saving this school, I’m at least going to spend my time off how I want._ She clicked the “Confirm” button, then took a look at the registration statistics.

No new applications. Same as yesterday. Same as every day.

Mari shut down the laptop for the night. Nothing had improved, but at least she had something to look forward to now.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well, that took a bit longer than I'd thought! Rather than writing everything in advance and uploading it all at once, as I had for Digital Disguise, I thought I'd upload this as I wrote it. Then after completing the first chapter, the rest of my 2019 was booked up with paid writing commissions, so this fic kind of had to take a back seat for a while.
> 
> If nothing else, the amount of time that I spent working on top of my day job was a good way of getting into some of what Mari's going through here, as neither of us had much time to ourselves. She takes on a huge responsibility as director of the school, way beyond what most teenagers would have to deal with. One of the reasons that I wanted to write this story was to explore the way that impacts on her wellbeing, as it's something that doesn't seem to get a huge amount of attention in the official media. Admittedly, that wouldn't really fit the upbeat tone of the Love Live franchise, so I get why it's pushed to one side.
> 
> I like the idea of Dia being an utterly dreadful liar - I feel like she's so honest so much of the time that she's never really needed to learn to lie convincingly. The one major thing that she hid from Ruby in the past (the real reason for her disdain for school idols), she didn't lie so much as deal with the problem through hostility and deflection.
> 
> As always, hope you enjoy this, and hopefully the next chapter won't take quite so long to deliver!


End file.
